In the span of a single month you've gone from a battle to close the achievement gap now to cutting the budget gap. Rather than standing up and fighting for the schools you've shown that you have absolutely no power and are giving our children absolutely no voice with the state government.

The answer here is clear, stand before the governor and say that PPS can not absorb the proposed budget cuts and still serve the children of Portland. You had your opportunity to speak out about this tonight at the Board Meeting. You could have refused to cut and sent a message across the entire state that schools can only be cut back so far before they fall.

Cutting physical and special education, raising class sizes and butchering staffing levels at K Through 8 is simply unacceptable. As parents of PPS children we've reached hard into our pockets and from our business's pockets with measures 66 & 67 to ensure that the schools have the funding and rainy day fund needed for such a crisis. I can understand that 2013 planning is also a concern, but the cuts proposed are simply unacceptable and the funds are there to preserve programs.

At some point we have to ask if there isn't a better way to educate our children than the Portland Public Schools and I am sure we are not alone. There is a threshold that once you cross will cost you student enrollment and deepen the financial issues that PPS faces.

You failed to put together a cohesive plan for the Highschool Redesign, don't fail PPS now. Stand up and fight for our schools, don't just roll over and slash them to bits.

Voters are just now seeing the true results of the property tax limitation they passed. They shifted the major costs for funding schools from local properrty taxes to the sate general fund without including any provisions for increasing the income taxes that funded the general fund. This was not a problem when Oregon's economy was booming and we were getting kicker checks regularly but now the state is not collecting enough income tax to fund everything the residents have asked the state to fund.

Ultimately you get what you pay for. Yes, education is important but so is police protection so the kids are safe, prisons to house the perverts who prey on the kids, social services to help feeed and house the kids whose families have run into problems. Senior services and halp for the disabled are also important.

This country is facing a reset in its lifestyle. Wages climbed with the boom in housing values - with a drastic cut, we have seen some decrease in wages plus a loss of many jobs that will never return. We need to look at state services and get rid of nice to have things like the Diversity Council (and mandatory diversity training) - nice to have but all the employees really need to know is the laws related to hiring and discrimination. Other things like the Blueberry council and agricultural research need to be funded by the groups they benefit.

I do not want to see massive layoffs of state employees as that will hurt Oregon's recovery but I do think that they need to rein in the costs of those employees. The Reset Committee had some good recommendations for cutting employee costs. Now they need to look are the agencies and councils they have. Get rid of any duplication of services and streamline processes. If you have to gut the services that an agency provides in order to save costs you will reach a point where there is no reason to have that agency.

The state has a lot of internal auditors in the various agencies and with the Secretary of State's office. Put those people to work looking at services that are provided by the state. Determine how many layers or management are involved in providing that service and look for bottlenecks that slow down providing that service (which usually translate into higher costs). Poll the workers - they often have ideas that can make things more efficient.

Make state workers more productive - no more furloughs in the next budget. Freeze the wages if needed instead so they have a full work week to get their work done. Make sure all contracts with independent contractors are setup so that they are paid a flat price for the finished product or service. Same thing with other contracts. Too often, the state goes with the lowest bidder and ends up paying a lot more due to cost overruns."